had my share already. By-the-bye, when a man of the world
falls into a bit of luck, has a few shillings extra in his pocket--I'm
ashamed to speak of it, but there's a rule of conduct in the case. No
treating, no purchase of expensive class-books, no squaring of old
debts; borrow, don't lend."

"Macfarlane," began Fettes, still somewhat hoarsely, "I have put my neck
in a halter to oblige you."

"To oblige me?" cried Wolfe. "Oh, come! You did, as near as I can see
the matter, what you downright had to do in self-defence. Suppose I got
into trouble, where would you be? This second little matter flows
clearly from the first. Mr. Gray is the continuation of Miss Galbraith.
You can't begin and then stop. If you begin, you must keep on beginning;
that's the truth. No rest for the wicked."

A horrible sense of blackness and the treachery of fate seized hold upon
the soul of the unhappy student.

"My God!" he cried, "but what have I done? and when did I begin? To be
made a class assistant--in the name of reason, where's the harm in that?
Service wanted the position; Service might have got it. Would _he_ have
been where _I_ am now!"

"My dear fellow," said Macfarlane, "what a boy you are! What harm _has_
come to you? What harm _can_ come to you if you hold your tongue? Why,
man, do you know what this life is? There are two squads of us--the
lions and the lambs. If you're a lamb, you'll come to lie upon these
tables like Gray or Jane Galbraith; if you're a lion, you'll live and
drive a horse like me, like K----, like all the world with any wit or
courage. You're staggered at the first. But look at K----! My dear
fellow, you're clever, you have pluck. I like you, and K---- likes you.
You were born to lead the hunt; and I tell you, on my honour and my
experience of life, three days from now you'll laugh at all these
scarecrows like a High School boy at a farce."

And with that Macfarlane took his departure and drove off up the wynd
in his gig to get under cover before daylight. Fettes was thus left
alone with his regrets. He saw the miserable peril in which he stood
involved. He saw, with inexpressible dismay, that there was no limit to
his weakness, and that, from concession to concession, he had fallen
from the arbiter of Macfarlane's destiny to his paid and helpless
accomplice. He would have given the world to have been a little braver
at the time, but it did not occur to him that he might still be brave.
The secret of Ja